The SitePoint Forums have moved.

You can now find them here.
This forum is now closed to new posts, but you can browse existing content.
You can find out more information about the move and how to open a new account (if necessary) here.
If you get stuck you can get support by emailing forums@sitepoint.com

If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Which framework

I am creating a site with lots of content. I want to be able to update the content and have php automatically insert the new items into my webpages.

For example say I have a folder of articles as text files. I will add new files/articles to this folder -which also has sub-folders for different categories of articles.

I want php to scan the folders and automatically display the articles in my webpages, eg: in my webpage of articles about food -the php will find all the files/articles in the food subfolder of the articles directory and display a list of articles in a pre-defined css layout -with each article's title and description specified in the file. And do the same for each category of articles. Or maybe even perhaps if I specify category tags in the article files instead of using subfolders -the articles can appear in multiple categories.

I am quite happy -for now to create webpage/index controllers that grab the data from my articles directory, but having multiple categories that need to be updated takes a lot of time.

I only know how to create the simplest of php template systems for my outer html layout/shell. I presume I will need to create a more advanced sql database for the functionality I am looking for.

I am also interested in dynamically created webpages, but I understand search engines have trouble reading them. Is there is an application that runs dynamic php and webpage files and then compiles dozens or hundreds of webpages from them? I wonder if this kind of compilation is ever necessary, or if php/sql can do all the work on the fly and somehow make it perfect for search engines -I mean if the webpages do not exist(until requested to be generated by someone requesting a webpage via a link on my site), then they will only be crawled by search engines if you create an absolutley flawless sitemap and the search engine crawls the site map flawlessly -both of which I do believe impossible for a website with hundreds of webpages. Also there is the fact that dynamic php pages take a long time to load when requested by a user, so if I can spend a few hours compiling my own pages before I upload them to my live-server, then the pages will be ready online for people to view, as well as search engines for crawling purposes.

I googled this myself, had a hard time picking a php framework also, everybody has his oppinion about wich is the best.
All that i can say is that at least this three where always in discussion and where somebody's best randomly: zend framework, cakephp, symfony.

I am also interested in dynamically created webpages, but I understand search engines have trouble reading them.

False SEs have no problems with dynamic pages. Why do you think the Sitepoint's forums end up in SE result pages?

I wonder if this kind of compilation isever necessary, or if php/sql can do all the work on the fly andsomehow make it perfect for search engines -I mean if the webpages donot exist(until requested to be generated by someone requesting awebpage via a link on my site)...

Err no, the pages do exists unless a 404 HTTP error is returned by the server. Until then the pages exists and are treated no different.

Also thereis the fact that dynamic php pages take a long time to load whenrequested by a user...

Again no, HTTP is far slower then it takes to compile PHP. However if it does become an issue utilize caching.

Logic without the fatal effects.
All code snippets are licensed under WTFPL.

There have been plenty of discussions on php frameworks, I'd encourage you to at least read through a couple of them. But when it comes to frameworks the main concern is usually whether to use a full stack framework like CakePHP, Symfony or Codeigniter or to use a glue framework like Zend Framework. Stack frameworks are

A glue framework provides you with a bunch of components that you can use together, but don’t necessarily have to. Zend Framework is a PHP glue framework, as it comes with all these cool components that you can pick and choose depending on what you need done.

A full stack framework gives you everything you need to create your web app, and pretty much forces you to use it. CakePHP is a full-stack framework.

If your running PHP4 and would like to keep it that way that also limits you to CakePHP or Codeigniter. Personally, I tend toward Zend Framework. I like the the loosely decoupled libraries that I can pull apart and use when I need to though it's considerably harder to learn.

Creativity knows no other restraint than the
confines of a small mind. - MeGeekly Humor
Oh baby! Check out the design patterns on that framework!

Another full stack framework that's only PHP 5, but it is fully OO, is Kohana, it was based on CodeIgniter but more robust.
I'm not an expert in frameworks, used only two: CakePHP and Kohana, and I must say that I will never look back at CakePHP. Kohana is way more configurable and has a nice DB access library (ORM and pure DB).

I looked at cake and zend.
Just be looking at the source code I can tell that cake looks creepy
and zend looks good enough to use.
I also looked a drupal source and was not impressed.

Not that I am recommending zend, but just between zend and cake, go with zend.

I also wrote my own CMS that can do what you want. You can upload existing documents and it will convert them into html pages and add as new content. For example, you can upload a word document or a document created with OpenOffice and it will go into you page. It will even extract images and re-save them in your document has embedded images.

It does not have a good support for sub-folders, it does have category support now, but I will switch to 'tags' later.

CodeIgniter, well its most formidable positive is its user guide, seconded by its community. If you need help, there are lots of people in their forums to respond. I think its also the easiest framework to learn. If you have a basic understanding of OOP then all it takes is a quick read of the Getting Started section in the docs.